Whether you're voting for Romney or Obama tomorrow, neither candidate comes close to offering a tax rate sweet enough to sate the appetite of Apple, Inc. (AAPL), the world's most profitable technology company, and most valuable firm in terms of present market capitalization.

In 2011, Apple made a fortune on foreign earnings, paying a lowly 2.5 percent on the $25B USD it earned outside the U.S. Financial documents filed last week indicate that the company's fiscal year, which concluded in September, saw an even bigger revenue boom outside the U.S.

Here's where things get a little confusing. The $41.7B USD is a post-tax figure that assumes Apple's effective U.S. tax rate extends to its foreign earnings. Apple is currently hoarding that cash overseas -- an estimated $82.6B USD, but it breaks from some in not reporting all of it as earnings.

It also has avoided spending the massive profits, gained by using tax shelters like the Cayman Islands, Ireland, and small European tax-haven nation states. It is estimated that Apple's decision not to include the tax-sheltered earnings in its bottom line cost it an extra $10.5B USD of profits (on paper, at least) over the last three years).

Apple paid less than 2 percent in taxes on its overseas earnings.
[Image Source: SomanyMP3s]

Apple's decision to not report the gains as profits is interesting, and perhaps a reflection that Apple believes that the U.S. government will eventually force technology companies to "pay up" amid growing scrutiny of corporate tax sheltering practices.

Apple, which almost exclusively manufacturers its products in China, is not alone in its smart-sourcing of profits to tax shelters and manufacturing to cheap Asian labor sources. Google Inc. (GOOG), Apple's perennial smartphone foe has engaged in similar practices, although not to such a massive extent.

The on-paper general corporate tax rate in the U.S. is 35-percent, however, that figure is misleading as the complex U.S. tax code typically leaves a wealth of loopholes available for big businesses to lower their rates. With loopholes considered, the average for Fortune500 tech companies is around 16 percent [source].

Apple does indirectly contribute a great deal to the U.S. economy, directly and indirectly creating 304,000 U.S. jobs, plus an additional 210,000 U.S. iOS developer jobs.

Except for the fact that to be informed you need information. Over the last couple decades all the news outlets have been bought up and are controlled by about 3 mega corporations. Fair and balance, ha, has changed to you hear what they want you to hear.

You're implying that more information exists than is presented by the news media. Yet for you to know this, you must have been able to attain this information from another source. That directly contradicts your argument that our access is controlled.

So clearly the information is available. Maybe you were attempting to make the argument that it isn't spoon fed to you. Fine. I'll concede that. But it still doesn't change the fact that it's your power to vote, and your responsibility to be informed before doing so.

So most people are stupid and lazy, but somehow you and I managed to figure it out? And you want to cater to the stupid and lazy?

Why don't we a) give people some credit. If you can figure it out, so can someone else. And b) let's stop these stupid "ROCK THE VOTE!!!!" campaigns that encourage the most uninformed among us to vote. Educate yourself and vote if you care. Don't, if you don't.

Yes because the only information in the world comes from major news corporations.

It's not like we have this giant repository of data at our fingertips that is from thousands of different sources all over the world. If only we did. We could call it.....the world wide web....shame....